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Jan 31, 2014

Anne Tolley: an agent of colourblind racism?

Tolley said she was insulted by Green Party claims that she was out of touch.

"I'm actually insulted to be lectured about how out of touch I am with average New Zealand by a list MP who has no constituents, lives in a castle and comes to the House in $2000 designer jackets and tells me I'm out of touch," Tolley said.

It is not the first time National MPs have attacked Turei's choice of clothing. Justice Minister Judith Collins said last year on Twitter that a speech by Turei was "vile, wrong and ugly, just like her jacket today".

It’s easy to think that racism is an act that belonged to other people, in another time, in another place. Except it isn’t. And it never was.

Some New Zealanders are aware of the realities of the racial hierarchy: the wealth gap; the employment gap; the apprehension, prosecution and conviction gap. But less New Zealanders appreciate the language of racism. Not the language of niggers, kikes and kaffirs. But of "semantic moves" - of coded insults and racist premises.

We live in the age of racism without racists. Racism comes with its own stigma. People want to avoid that. But rather than change their behaviour, society has invented rhetorical parachutes. Suddenly racism can’t exist without racial words. Racism becomes the use of "Wogistan", but not the history and ideas that sustain it.

Tolley didn’t need to mention race. Her attack is loaded with social, political and racial assumptions. The unspoken context is that Metiria, a Maori woman who lives well and dresses better, is acting out of turn and out of step with her community. How can she be in touch with her community when she isn’t living like them? The premise is that a Maori woman cannot dress well and claim to represent her people. Because Maori live exclusively in poverty, amirite.

But Tolley can. She dresses like her community, lives with them and – it seems – perpetuates their prejudices. The premise is that her community is well off and that gives her the right to live well, dress well and hold power. Tolley is constructing a self-serving stereotype. A world of (literally) black and white where binary assumptions can be made about how racial communities live.

Metiria explains further:

"I think they seem to think it is all right for them to wear perfectly good suits for their professional job but that a Maori woman from a working-class background is not entitled to do the same. I think it is pure racism."

Ask how the attack was racist, Turei said she shopped at the same place some of her opponents did.

"They do not think that a professional Maori woman from a working-class background should be able to wear good suits to work," she said.

"I buy my clothes from some of the same shops they do. I think they find that they can't cope with that and I think it's because I'm a Maori woman from a working-class background."

The common refrain is Tolley didn't invoke racial terms, ipso facto, she isn't racist. But it takes a determined effort in self-deception to strip Tolley’s remarks of their racial context. Metiria doesn't conform to Tolley's idea of what and who Maori should be, therefore Metiria is out of touch with her community. That's racial stereptyping. That's colourblind racism.

A hijacked version of colourblindness has become the dominant racial ideology in New Zealand (and across the west). Because of that most New Zealanders are hyper-attuned to racialism. But what they refuse to acknowledge is when racial stereotypes – stripped of their overtly racial words – are projected onto individuals, situations and communities. Like, say, when the assumption of Maori poverty is projected onto a Maori politician.

There are several comparisons: when people discuss the warrior gene it can be framed as “science” and not a narrative used to explain inherent Maori criminality and violence. Welfarism can be used as morse code - a way to talk about Maori dependency without explicitly racialising the prejudice. Positive discrimination can be used to attack the growth of the Maori worldview in universities. The subtext is clear. It's colourblind racism.

If there's no such thing as race - "I don't see in colour" - there can be no such thing as racial disadvantage. We're all a lump of humanity that cannot be distinguished. But this sort of colourblind racism is self-serving. It preserves the status quo and ignores why some people are better off than others. Where the colourblind ideologies of liberalism aimed to control for prejudice in society, the colourblind ideologies dominant today work to validate prejudice.

“You start out in 1954 by saying, “Nigger, nigger, nigger.” By 1968 you can’t say “nigger”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “Nigger, nigger.”

Racial ideologies are highly contested. Rejecting colourblind racism is a political struggle. Colourblind racism seeks to silence multicultural pluralism and, instead, celebrate a kind of monocultural nationalism that can't include non-conformists. That serves the status quo. Racial progress is stalled. We can't allow the racists to create their imaginary future. And calling Tolley on her (conscious or unconscious) racism is part of that.

38 comments:

For goodness sake Morgan; this is a total overreaction from Metiria Turei. She's far too quick to play the racism card, yet she is silent when a NZ First MP makes a xenophobic attack on Asian immigrants.

Are you accusing her of being racist, except when it's directed at herself? Racism is all about context. It's no longer as obvious and clumsy as nigger, nigger nigger - as Atwater explains - it can be about stereotypes, unspoken premises and so on. Maybe Metiria was overreacting. Maybe Tolley meant nothing by it. But that doesn't absolve the stereotype. As a Maori person who isn't poor, isn't brown, and doesn't fit in many other categories that people think are stereotypically Maori, it enrages me to see MPs put other Maori people in a box (all Maori are poor, brown etc).

I could be critical of this post but I can't because I presumably would be condemned as racist. I missed the bit in the Treaty of Waitangi that bans critical analysis if there is any possibility of perception by the target that it could be deemed racist.

I'm sad that you resorted to snark, Pete. I'd be interested if you engaged with the ideas. But in absence of that, let me direct you to two texts that deal with this issue. Maybe without the partisan context you'd be more willing to expand your worldview. Try Racial Crossings by Associate Professor Damon Salesa from Auckland University for an idea of the historical roots of racism in the Anglosphere. Then try Racism Without Racists by Professor Eduardo Bonilla Silve from Duke University for the contemporary tactics of racism, including an explanation of why and how racism is used without explicit racial context.

That is just as bad. So you have to stay poor to represent poor people? Regardless of their political views politicians earn good money... Hopefully we have enough social mobility in this country that even people shouldn't be forced to conform to their parent's social status.

We can also try 'Maori News Is Bad News' by Ranginui Walker to further emphasise the point, maybe 'Maori Media' by C Archie or 'New(s) Racism: A Discourse Anaytical Approach' by Teun van Dijk to have a look at what this article and Turei are more or less referring to. I, too, find it saddening and frustrating that people are calling this an overreaction (though opinions make the world go round), as it truly shows the underlying problem of racism in New Zealand which is assisted by the news media that gives air to comments made by Tolley as if they were right and the 'norm'.

How you dress has nothing to do with whether you are in touch with your community. It is as you say: suggesting she's not for real because she dresses well is really saying that she's not Maori enough because Maori are poor. The insinuation is insidious but clear. Great post, Morgan.

Only if you regard "Maori" and "poor" as interchangeable, which is racist. Tolley was being juvenile and bitchy, but she was clearly talking class and economic status - she didn't mention anything about race. One wonders if being rude about Paula Bennett's weight and fondness for leopard print is also racist given that she's 1/8th Tainui .

Exactly right - that's what Tolley was saying: Maori are poor. I mean, it's no secret that poverty in NZ is quite a brown issue - meaning those in poverty in 2014 are largely brown - but that doesn't mean that Maori people are or should be poor. It was a low blow; Anne Tolley and Judith Collins are being vicious high school bitches.

Great read. It puts alot in perspective and can draw on a number of recent experiences myself e.g the decision for my husband and I to only speak Maori to our young children attracted many remarks from the playground to playgroups to daycare and beyond!, BUT i will leave that for another post. Thanks for the post. Dee from hamilton

Meteria says she shops at some of the same places her opponents do. that is the problem. The moment you start thinking $2000 for a jacket is normal, you are divorced from the reality of working class people (white brown or any colour) in this country. The leaders of the Greens do not represent the poor. As pablo on kiwipolitico has been writing recently, there is no socialist left in this country and we need one.

Mark I don't think that Metiria thinks that wearing an expensive jacket is necessarily normal (especially when you see her in her home environment) but certain jobs come with certain expectations. When Metiria fronts up as the co-leader for a political party that aspires to be in government, expectations of performance and appearance is part of that (jeans and a sweat shirt wouldn't be appropriate). Sadly to have credibility in this world part of it is to have the appropriate look, which is why I wear a suit and tie when I am advocating for others in my union role in employment disputes. Michael Savage did more than many in supporting the working class but he still wore a suit.

Mark - Isn't that just the problem with working class representation in parliament in general though? I wouldn't single Turei out for particular criticism because she wears a $2000 jacket to parliament and there is no doubt of the coded racism of Tolley, et al.

Great post, Morgan. I agree with Metiria's response to Tolley's dubious remarks. They were socially coded and loaded, and ironically, couched within the language of identity politics, but without the understanding. I wonder if Tolley has ever questioned Gareth Morgan's criticisms of social disparity on the grounds that he isn't poor? If so, I haven't read it, but I doubt it. Tolley would consider Gareth Morgan her peer. This was Tolley's way of reminding Metiria to "know her place" in the social hierarchy. Pity Tolley elides "merit" because on the scale of things, Tolley is a dismal failure in the roles she's performed, even though she appears to think she's from the 'born to rule' class.

Excellent post. The only people who think that Tolley's comments are harmless are those whose culture is so dominant, it's they can't even see it and therefore consider their worldview to be the ONLY worldview.

Well written Morgan. To those who are dismissing this as an over-reaction from Turei, I think it would be wise for you all to try to understand the connotations that Tolley's comments contained. It's one thing to bitch about someone's choice of clothing, but to suggest that their choice of clothing and where they live makes them out of touch with the people is not only hypocritical and ridiculous; it is a attack full of diminishing assumptions. Turei has done well to contain a justifiable outrage and not to make an equally personal attack on them. The fact that she has rightfully pointed the comments out to be exactly what they are and moved on says a lot about the strength of her character and competency as a leader. Right on.

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, Morgan.If racism becomes so subtle that it can no longer be distinguished from the general noise of discourse or from fundamental attribution error, I would suggest it has limited use except as a lazy baton with which to silence any argument or criticism.

''Vile, wrong and ugly just like your jacket" -judith Collins. These are the people running our country, not to mention why women aren't taken seriously when we bitch at each other and kick each other to the ground based on how fat or thin we are or what we wear. Not to mention the wider social impact eg: the example u set for how young women should interact with each other, Grow up politicians & act like the leaders we expect you to be.

"But Tolley can. She dresses like her community, lives with them and – it seems – perpetuates their prejudices. The premise is that her community is well off and that gives her the right to live well, dress well and hold power."

She is the MP for the East Coast electorate, though, and in her criticism of Turei she specifically mentioned her own work in communities that are among the poorest in the country, while Turei - a list MP - "lives in a castle", wears expensive clothing, etc. I think you are right to emphasise the barely coded racism of those remarks, but I think it goes further: what Tolley is saying is that she is more qualified to speak for poor Maori; that her connection with them is more real.

Thank you for your post here. I've just been over to kiwiblog by david farrer, notice I gave him lower-case? And the horrible, racist, sexist and extremely nasty comments made by very racist white people is quite disturbing. Of course many whites aren't racist. However, obviously Metiria jarred many of the nasty whites, to the point where their privilege is being challenged and they don't want to face it. They'd rather make countless put downs rather than see what they are actually the beneficiaries of. It's also disturbing reading how many of them feel they are second class citizens. These are the same people who live in $700,000 to $1000000 households and I don't see them giving their money to the poor or even visiting or helping them. It's also scarey to think these same people operate out in the open, but pretend not to be racists yet ARE. However good on Metiria because transperancy and truth always wins in the end.

The alleged racism here is probably a little too nuanced here for me to identify. But the paternalism, sarcasm and faux indignance from the two ministers were sure laid on thick. Couldn't miss that from the moon. And Ms Turei provided a lot of context to her 'castle' in the Sunday Herald this morning. Mansion? Doesn't sound like it.

You cannot accept that anyone like Tolley could make an honest criticism; instead you accuse her of the prejudices of her community, a comment that reveals your prejudice. "Colourblind racism" is no more than a rhetorical device by which you can accuse white people of racism even when they are saying nothing racist.

I think the premise here is quite simple. Turei accused Tolley for being out of touch because she's a rich Nat who is an MP for an area with a lot of poverty, and Tolley's argument is that someone who claims to advocate for the poor but wears $2000 jackets and lives in a castle isn't any more in touch with the poor than she is.

For the comment to be racist, an awful amount of assumption is needed. Assumption that could easily be applied to Turei's comments-i.e. because Tolley is Pakeha, she can't possibly be in touch with the large population of Maori who live within the boundaries in her electorate.

And there you have it. Last night's IV with Metiria Turei on Campbell Live cutting through all the loaded and coded attacks on her to reveal that her lifestyle and sartorial choices genuinely reflect her, not the cynical politician she was being portrayed as. I suppose even if Ministers Tolley and Collins had appeared in the story it wouldn't have made one iota of difference to the outcome - that these bullys were caught out badly. Minister Tolley might want to take time to reflect on this episode and her conduct during Question Time.

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